Tag Archives: Depression

I have been meaning to come on here for days and write, because I’ve been craving it. It hasn’t been for lack of things to write about…

This week has been an incredibly crazy week filled with a large roller coaster ride of emotions that has just left me feeling plain exhausted. For the last two days, I’ve done nothing but lay in bed pouting and complaining about how sore my body is. There have been good moments and bad over the last few days, but I seem to be stuck in a rut when it comes to whatever feeling it is that I’ve been having that seems to come and go, well, for the last few days it’s been staying and holding tight with a deadly grip.

I wouldn’t say this is depression, because the feeling isn’t sad really. Then again, I’m sleeping a lot lately and I have a thousand and one reasons why depression would make sense. And maybe I am a little depressed and just in denial, but it’s not to this terrible point yet. I’m just beginning to notice that it’s beginning to affect me negatively and as I’ve said, these come and go in waves (as you’ll notice if you read back over the last few months), so I’m sure the tide is going to flow outwards again and I’ll be able to catch my breath.

So let’s talk about the last few days…

First, we started watching Dexter on Netflix. I really really love this show like crazy. We’ve even let the kids watch a few episodes and it is the most interested in a TV show we seem to be able to get them lately. Even got The Boyfriend hooked. But what I didn’t expect from this show was how much it would act as a major trigger for me. I kept thinking, “There should be a warning somewhere…”, because on multiple occasions it has brought me back to places where terrible things have happened or terrible thoughts have occurred and I just wasn’t expecting it at all… For the most part, this is easy to deal with in the moment and I’m often over it shortly after the show ended, but some of the things seem to really be sticking in my mind and keeping the tide over my head.

Then, Kenzie and I have not been doing very well together. For some reason, he is in the stage of absolutely hating my guts and making it known at every possible turn. Obviously I know that he doesn’t actually hate my guts, but he insists on saying it to me every single day, multiple times a day. The one that is the hardest to deal with is the first thing in the morning one, which just turns my entire day to crap before it even gets started. There’s no worse way to start your day than to hear “I hate you” coming from your flesh and blood’s mouth.

We went through much the same thing with Kaeidyn, right around this age too, and for the life of me, I can’t remember how we dealt with it. I know that it didn’t last as long with Kaeidyn as it is with Kenzie and everything that we’ve attempted to do with Kenzie thus far has not worked at all. It all seems to add fuel to the fire and it’s been difficult. I often feel the least in control of my kids in that moment and like I’m never going to feel as if they respect me and all that I’ve done for them. Being over-dramatic I suppose…

The Boyfriend and I had program again this week, which goes as good as it always does. This was basically a review of the questionnaires that we filled out the last time we had went and basically to see where we stand based on our answers to all these questions. Oddly enough, on the depression test, The Boyfriend scored as more depressed than I was and it was the first time in my life that I scored as only mildly at risk for depression. My favorite part of this whole entire appointment was when we were going over our Parenting Confidence and Satisfaction questionnaires, in which both The Boyfriend and I scored very high in our overall confidence but rather low on the satisfaction end of thing. Our worker asks, “Why do you think you got this result?” and The Boyfriend throws up his hands and goes, “This!”.

We both broke off to explain the “This!” as being more than just the program itself, but the whole parenting situation that we’ve been experiencing for the last few months, what with all the child services visits and the constant issues with the kids and the feeling of being so overwhelmed by this job. I pointed out that there was never any question about how good of parents we were, but how good of housekeepers we were and yet we had to go to parenting classes not housekeeping classes. We both vented and it felt really good and really nice. It’s also nice because our worker strongly believes in focusing on the positive, so we haven’t heard much negative at all about our parenting which is nice!

In other news entirely, we just jumped over the 100 member mark in The Erotic Writers Group Google+ Community. I’m spending as much of the rest of the night as The Boyfriend will let me catching up on all the stuff that I’ve missed out on over the last few days of my absence from the computer. Hopefully I’ll be able to update you with more about all that fun stuff later. Well, I hope you’re all having a wonderful weekend and staying warm during this lovely “spring” snowstorm 😉

It’s been a really long time since I last wrote and I’m hating it, but frankly, I have had absolutely no desire at all to get on the computer. I’ve barely had any desire to do anything. To be quite honest, I think I’m just finally breaking out of a couple week’s long bout of depression… Almost 5 years without any signs of it and now it feels like it’s been creeping in on me.

There have been no real reasons behind this at all, just a general feeling of sadness that has persisted despite everything I’ve done to change it – save for taking any medication. Maybe it all stems from the fact that I began losing interest in the computer and so haven’t been on it for quite a long time. It’s to the point where the whole family is getting annoyed that I’m not going on the computer anymore…

It’s also been a pretty rough couple of weeks these last few. From all the dealings with child service (yes, we’re still dealing with them), to the kids really misbehaving, to a general lack of money and a house that I can’t seem to keep clean, it’s all just a little overwhelming. It just keeps feeling like there is disappointment at every single corner and the disappointments in everything are just stacking up now.

And really, I’ve only had 2 really bad days, during a period where every word Kaeidyn and I were saying to each other resulted in a fight. For those two days, going to bed was full of tears and the moment my eyes opened in the moment, full of tears. It’s so much rougher than I ever anticipated it could be with an 8-year-old that is so full of attitude. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so sympathetic towards my Mom and what she had to go through with me at those ages. And frankly, I’m terrified of her getting any older than this.

The boys have also had more energy than they know what to do with. So, I’ve got the mental exhaustion of Kaeidyn and the physical exhaustion of Kenzie, Keirnan and Carter and while I have a great help in The Boyfriend, there are just too many times when he’s not here and I’m left alone to deal with it all. Add on top of all of that that I feel like I’m never dealing with it in a way that makes me feel good when I walk away from it, and it’s hard to not spend my entire days thinking about how much I’m failing as a Mom and that just generally makes you feel crappy.

The people in my life that matter to me, like my Mom and The Boyfriend and a few others, tell me that I’m not absolutely failing as a Mom. In The Boyfriend’s eyes, I’m the best Mom out there and I do so much for the kids and he wouldn’t ask for anyone else to be the Mom to his kid. Of course, I always think he’s just saying those things because he feels obligated to say them or just because he doesn’t know any better himself. My Mom will tell me that I’m not absolutely failing, just that I have a few areas to work on, to improve. But still, not the crappiest Mom in the world. But for some reason, the people that doesn’t matter to me at all in my life, such as child services, they say that I’m not the best Mom and I take that as I’m a total failure who is obviously not meant to raise these kids.

More than once in the past few weeks have I seriously considered sending the older three to live with their Dad or to just plain tell child services to take them, because the feeling that I can’t do it at all, that I can’t be a good parent to them is sometimes so overwhelming that I feel like giving up. And then I feel horrible for feeling like giving up, because I’ve always been prideful of the fact that I’ve been here for these kids through thick and thin, no matter what, for their entire lives. I’ve never given up, so it’s incredible difficult on an emotional level to have those thoughts at any time… To think about giving up.

I imagine, now that The Boyfriend has finally gotten me back on the computer, that you can expect another post in a day or so. But this was just a started to let you know some of what’s been going on that has kept me away from you. Feels good to finally write again!

I’ve always wanted someone to ask me how long I’ve been blogging for, because I’ve always been curious myself. I don’t know how long I’ve been blogging for to be completely sure. I know I wrote for a little while on a site called MyDiary, I think it was, though I couldn’t tell you what I wrote about or what name I used while writing it. I also made multiple websites using Angelfire that included blogs from as early as 2003 or something like that.

But my first dedicated effort at blogging, when I really began putting some weight behind an account, was in 2008. Using Opera and the pen name “Unpredictable Angel”, I began treading lightly through the blogosphere with my first post, Miseria Cantare (The Beginning). At the time, I was a 21-year-old mom of 3 and in a relationship with Alfie (the dad of my oldest three kids, in case you didn’t know) and it really was a disaster…

Kenzie, Mommy & Keirnan, Kaeidyn

This blog is definitely much more raw than what I write now and even what I wrote when I was doing The Rantings of a Tortured Mind (PG & XXX Rated Editions). I reveal a whole heck of a lot in a short period of time and reading through it am actually a little shocked. I mean, at the time, this was exactly what I needed and the entire reason why I started blogging. I was coming out of a major depressive episode (which had landed me in the mental institution more than once) and I was in way over my head on so many different levels that, to this day, I am shocked that I survived.

In one post, I write a little fictional story or something – trust me, I have no idea what brought this about, but reading through it now, I’m totally vibing a particular section. Maybe, I’m Lola…

“But you underestimate the power of passion. When a girl is born from passion, and perfectly manifests passion, she can not hold back what has already been done. And unfortunately at times, passion has no boundaries and passion is bold. When passion manifests from one who was born from passion, at a young age a girl discovers who she is and what she wants, because she has the drive to do so, and so she does.”

Talking about soundtracks to people’s lives and how wishing life was more like TV, and in what I’m now going to call my finest hour, “It makes me sad that I’m one of those people, who just watches TV and wishes somehow my life could be like that. Just funny, or with background music.” and moments later in my not so finest hour, “…the sex is good, but I can live without it…”. Oh, how times have changed…

In another post, I go into great lengthy detail about how intense a bout of depression that I went through had gotten and how seriously it was affecting me. I discuss my worries about taking medication to help with the depression, which I ended up never going back on meds and for the most part have done pretty well without, though I have considered returning to medication especially around storm season. “The thing that I think a lot of people forget, is that it’s easy to be sane when you’re in a mental hospital.”

I also experienced thesame problemwith Alfie that I’m currently experiencing with The Boyfriend regarding munches and kink. Interestingly enough, in both situations the guys were into it prior to me having a baby, and then I pop one out and they all turn vanilla. Maybe it’s the oxytocin or something… That is something someone should study!

Kenzie (about 1 1/2)

Well, that was an interesting little trip down memory lane. There’s still more to read on there, but I figure I’ve shared a whole heck of a lot tonight. One of these days I’m going to go through my other blogs too and we’ll see what happens then 😉

10 more comments and I’ve reached 200! That’s pretty exciting, though I bet half of those are from me…

I woke up this morning, in a pretty rotten mood. First, Kaeidyn threw a hissy fit over a shirt that she couldn’t find. I, of course, didn’t completely understand what her issue was being that she was wearing a perfectly fine shirt. So that was step one to a rotten mood. And the whining about this shirt lasted all morning until they finally left for school. I was so upset by this stupid fight first thing in the morning, I decided I was going back to bed.

It took me forever to start falling back asleep, which was a good sign in all honesty. Lately, I’ve been finding it too easy to fall asleep. So I was quite happy that it wasn’t coming easily and that I laid there quite awake for quite awhile. Then, Carter came and snuggled with me and within minutes I was falling back to sleep. Unfortunately, I had not realized that along the way, my alarm clock got unplugged. I woke up just in time to get Keirnan ready for school, but was concerned that I didn’t have enough time to get him to school. I called Mom to see if she’d be willing to drop him off and she was.

While the house isn’t that messy, the kitchen is, but the house in general isn’t, my Mom right away started in on me. Not so much about the mess as it was about how dark it was in here even though the sun was shining bright and she could tell that it was taking it’s toll on me. She said it was obvious that I was feeling a little depressed and overwhelmed. I hadn’t even really realized it, but when she said it, it made sense. She made me open my curtain in the living room (which hasn’t been done since they got put up weeks ago) and forced me to open a window, even though the whole time I was saying it wasn’t necessary.

By the way I feel now, she was definitely right! I always think it’s amazing how Mom’s can do this kind of stuff. I’m always shocked when my Mom’s right about things, I seriously don’t know what it is. It’s just too bad that her advice never seems to work for her, because she is majorly stressed out or depressed. She knows it too but it’s more out of her control than my overwhelmed and depressed is…

We had a nice long talk after Keirnan got to school and that was really good. I hope for her as much as it was for me. I enjoy when we can just talk like we did and everything just feels good afterwards. I vent, she vents, we catch up on things and reminisce about other things. I definitely walk away from these talks feeling better about just about everything.

Then, I played on the computer and checked out a video that Carter and The Boyfriend had made last night and then it was time to go pick up the kids from school. Boy is it ever a nice day out today. I wore my sweater and my jacket, thinking I would be too cold because it looked windy out, but it was warm as heck. Almost all of the snow has melted and the sun is shining bright and it felt really good to go for that walk.

Had another bit of a tiff with Kaeidyn on the walk home about her backpack and her having to plan to have friends come over to the house, not just randomly deciding without asking any parents. I spent half the walk home lecturing her about her terrible attitude and her promising me it would stop, as long as she got to keep her backpack in her room. So sick of all the arguing happening with her. It seems like the only time her and I communicate is when we’re mad at each other and when our attitudes are in high gear. It’s exhausting and completely un-fun.

Well, that’s pretty much life in a nutshell right now. How’s your Monday going?

I cannot believe that it’s been 6 freaking days since I last wrote. I have been in the world’s worst funk ever these last few days and I have absolutely no idea why or what’s caused it and I have no clue when it’s going to break. The last two days, after a night when The Boyfriend and I were asleep by 9:00 PM (an incredible rarity for us!), I’ve seen glimpses of not so bad moments – so I’m hoping that’s a good sign, but it’s been rough.

I have just been so down and out. I can’t even describe how down and out I’ve been. At times, I’ve felt sad and at other times I’ve felt angry. I spent almost an entire day feeling completely worthless and heartbroken about something. So it’s really just been a huge mix of negative emotions the last few days, which has resulted in me being the laziest I’ve been in quite awhile. It’s also resulted in a few more missed days at work than usual and a lot of tension around the house. Everyone kind of walking on eggshells and me being incredibly sour.

There are about 1000 factors that could be causing these emotions, when we think about psychological triggers, though when I try to identify them, they don’t seem to fit right. Especially being that all my “triggers” are all pretty mundane things that don’t seem to actually affect me the way that I wish they would (example: my house is not clean at all!)… If that makes any sense?!? So at this point, I’ve established that this is an unknown funk, not a caused one.

So needless to say, my time on the computer has been very minimal. Mostly, I’ve been laying in bed watching TV or sleeping or pouting. When I have gotten on the computer the last couple of days, I just stare blankly at the screen or out the window, no thoughts running through my head – other than the odd, “I wish I could have a thought…” thought.

Well that’s been my week in a nutshell. I wish I could come up with more to say or something, but here I sit, blankly staring…

Today has taken just about every ounce of energy I’ve ever had in my entire life. The energy that I haven’t used up is being used up making sure I don’t crumble. It’s been a rough day to say the least.

Those of you who follow me on Twitter have heard me talking about crazy people a lot lately, as we’ve been dealing with my brother re-entering his psychosis, which they are now deeming as schizophrenia.

It all started a couple years back when my brother found out his girlfriend at the time was pregnant, though there was a lot of rumors that she had cheated on him and the kid wasn’t his. To this day, we still don’t know and she refuses to let him find out. He suddenly ditched out to BC and then moved around a lot from there, all the while experimenting with all sorts of drugs including Ketamine and MDMA.

Then, he came back in to town and he was straight up crazy. Constantly talking to himself and muttering under his breath. Eventually he gets sent out to the mental hospital here and things were looking up. He was taking his medication and everything seemed to be going fine. He got a job, found a place to live, and it looked like his life was on track.

Out of nowhere, about 3 or 4 weeks ago, he gets himself a girlfriend and next thing we know, he’s back to crazy. Worse than before. News hits of the earthquake in Japan, and suddenly he’s convinced that it’s going to happen to us here. Then he starts believing that the people at his work are out to kill him, so he stops going to work. After that, he starts showing up on everybody’s doorstep at odd hours of the day and night and insisting on giving everyone presents. I got broken markers and dice…

My Mom has suffered the blunt of his lunacy. She doesn’t take it very lightly at all and tends to often put all the blame on herself. Her and I are also very close, and very close to my brother. So because she suffered the blunt of it, I suffered the after effects of it. It’s been mentally overwhelming to say the least.

Today, we took him to the hospital under the rouse that we were going to get test results, the entire time Mom and I both secretly working towards getting him admitted to the hospital again. It took 6 1/2 hours, but I am relieved to say that for now, he is admitted to the hospital and is so far saying that he’ll take the medications they give him.

I’m saddened by the fact that we’re just going to have to get used to him being this way. I’m worried that he’ll never be the same brother I once had. I’m angry that our health system is so amazing, but at the same time so crappy. I only say that because when I went through my depression or whichever diagnoses you want to believe, the mental health system was my greatest savior. They really helped me. And I think, in comparison, what I went through mentally wasn’t nearly as bad as what my brother is going through mentally, and it seems to be so difficult to get him the help that he needs. It bugs me that people who don’t want to live, seem to be able to get all the help in the world, but people who do want to live and just have something seriously wrong with their brains, can’t get any help…

Add on top of the stress of my brother, all the other many stresses I’m feeling right now, and I just feel like sleeping through it all. From financial issues to not knowing what’s going to happen to my income now that I’m working, to having a deadline on filing my taxes, and getting a load limiter on my electricity, I am just incredibly stressed. I’m just glad that stress doesn’t affect me the way it used to, during what I think I’m going to start calling my “dark days”.

Then I’ve been massively stressing about Alfie-related things lately, which just bugs the crap out of me. I don’t know why it’s all happening now, this intense and extreme anger I feel towards him. The other night, my brother goes off about needing to get Alfie and The Boyfriend back together as friends, and I just straight out snapped at him. I’ve gotten to the point where just the mere mention of his name makes my blood curdle. I feel like screaming at anyone who respects the guy, and hitting the ones that count him as his friend, and I especially despise how many people ask me how he’s doing, as if I freaking care!

Today I made a very official decision though. For those who have read the better majority of this blog, you might remember awhile back I was complaining about Keirnan constantly coming home with pull-ups on. It was bugging me a lot, because Keirnan has been potty-trained for close to a year now. Every time the kids go to Alfie’s, he puts a pull-up on Keirnan, so Keirnan just does his business in the pull-up. When he gets home, he ends up forgetting that he’s not wearing the pull-up and pees the bed.

It’s been two weeks since they went to Alfie’s last and Keirnan hasn’t had a single nighttime accident. I’ve decided that if Alfie takes the kids again and Keirnan comes home with a pull-up on, I’ll be putting an end to the weekend visits. He’s potty-trained and if Alfie and his family can’t accept that and respect it, then they don’t need to be spending time with him. That may sound really bitchy, but I’ve successfully (and rather easily) potty-trained all of my kids and every time they put a pull-up on him, he regresses and it seriously bugs me. Keirnan’s got enough regression issues as it is, he doesn’t need potty-training added to that list!!

The Boyfriend is talking about going back to working graveyards. On one hand, I want him to simply for the money. At this point, we could really use that extra bit of money and the full-time hours. On the other hand, I’m freaking out about the idea. I remember what it was like him working graveyards, and I’ve said to him in the past that if he had stayed working graveyards the likelihood is that we would’ve already broken up. It put way too much strain on our relationship, though a big part of that was because Alfie was still here! I’m just worried about the whole idea of it again, so it’s a big ole mental battle.

Works been going really amazing and I’m absolutely loving this job. It’s been a really rewarding experience for me, and being the computer whiz that I am, I’m constantly coming up with ways in which our department can be run better. The best part is, my co-workers really listen to me when I voice my ideas and that makes coming up with those ideas a lot more fun. It’s nice having that 3 hours away from the hustle and bustle of daily life and stressing about my own crap.

I’m really hoping things start looking up really soon though. Right now, I feel like I’m constantly struggling to be my happy, cheery self. And it wouldn’t be so bad if it came on really gradually, but it didn’t. It just suddenly hit and that’s the part that I’m struggling the most with, is that I’ve had no time to prepare for the stress, mentally or physically.

After months of having little to no pain in my knees, suddenly it’s back with a vengeance. Then, I lost a couple pounds and an inch off my waist and hips, and now it’s all back and I have a feeling I’ve gained a couple of pounds. It’s been a rough week, which results in almost no eating during the day and then porking at night. Or results in me being incredibly lazy and hardly ever moving from my chair.

I also don’t think I’ve been sleeping very well. I seem to fall asleep relatively fast, which is completely new to me, but I have a hard time staying asleep. Waking up is being a nightmare lately, and I seem to be having massive issues with it. When I do wake up, I’m incredibly grumpy for at least the first half hour and that just stresses me out more…

So that’s my week in a nutshell! How has your week been going? What’s stressing you out right now?

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